Expansion at Tchincondo

I’ve visited the Anglican Church at Tchincondo from time to time over the last 3 years. The congregation started out simply meeting under a tree. Our fellow SIM Canada missionaries Norm & Audrey Henderson helped grow the church, not just supplying transportation for pastors to the remote village, but helping to provide an initial structure— a wooden frame with a tarp draped over it. I made a video about it in 2023 (link).

When Bethany and I last visited in 2024, the tarp was gone; what a pleasant surprise to find that since then, the congregation has had an entire church building constructed - brick walls and a metal roof. There’s not really any furniture or other furnishings, so there’s still room for further adjustment.

The people at Tchincondo are Nyaneka and many don’t speak Portuguese. All of the songs are sung in Nyaneka and now there’s an order of service that’s been adapted from Portuguese to Nyaneka. The preachers at Tchincondo typically preach in Portuguese and are then translated into Nyaneka by a lay leader from the congregation.

Bethany and I attended a service at Tchincondo with Audrey Henderson. Pedro, a young man studying accounting (and fortunately also some sound Bible training) preached on a passage from Exodus 16, Psalm 78, Romans 11 and Matthew 15, speaking about how we shouldn’t come to God simply to complain but also to give thanks to Him.

The service had 124 people, many of them young children. I’m sure that’s much more than I saw in the past - I think the most people I’d seen before were around 70. Perhaps this is because of the new church building - perhaps that sense of permanence draws more people from the surrounding area.

The parish’s pastor, Rev. Andre, wasn’t feeling very well that morning and didn’t come with us, instead taking services at Candjambumba. There’s a lot of pressure on him; he needs your prayers.

It’s very heartening to see Tchincondo gradually grow and expand; they’re far off from the paved roads (the nearest recognized town is Palanca) so you can’t really find the Tchincondo church unless you know it’s coordinates! May it continue to serve as a pillar of the growing community and that they will similarly increase in their understanding of who God is.

Michael Hoskin